Flying Stinks
by giraffeswearpantyhose
Summary: Just some fluff that happens when Q is forced onto an airplane for mission purposes.


**So this may or may not be entirely based off a story my grandparents told me the other day of their own hotel incident. I've always wanted to explore Q's fear of flight as well. It's almost all fluff and zero real plot but I needed to take a break from To Murder and Create. Enjoy.**

* * *

They were both pretty tipsy by the time Moneypenny managed to guide them into the swanky hotel.

The plane ride had been rough on both men, for various reasons. To begin with, plane rides all the way from London to Moscow were long. That gave 007's Quartermaster a lot of time to panic in new and interesting ways.

* * *

Bond had done his best to free Q from the necessity of physically traveling to Russia. He had argued with M for days and days and nearly frightened the life out of an up-and-coming intern when he had insisted that she could go in his partner's place. M had none of it. The mission required talent that only Q could provide and so go he must.

And go he did.

Sadly, things were never as simple as all that. Q was quite rational about most things; he had an analytical brain and logic ruled with him, but somehow being thrust into the air miles above ground in only a thin metal craft that shouldn't have been able to leave the ground in the first place didn't fit in his mind so well.

All had been fine through airport security and through baggage check and even throughout the dreadful two hour wait outside the gate. Bond might have had something to do with that. He wasn't happy, in fact he had been ignoring M's summons for two weeks, about subjecting his (could he be called a boyfriend?) partner to his greatest fear but he wasn't unhappy with the company. Moneypenny had even been cleared, if briefly, for field service since all the other agents were otherwise occupied.

No, Bond wasn't unhappy to have a beautiful woman in a beautiful dress and his boy whippet of a Quartermaster along for the ride. The mission was meant to be laughably easy; they only needed Q for a hacker that had to be dealt with on-site.

Bond joked and flirted with Q the whole morning and Moneypenny giggled when she found them sharing Earl Grey out of a massive mug before the flight, Q tucked into Bond like a large and content house cat. Bond had been as at ease as he ever was. Q had matched him joke for joke up until the plane's wheels began to leave the steady earth.

Cutting off mid-chortle, the technician gripped the agent's arm in a punishing vise. As the aircraft tipped upward, the Quartermaster began to babble incoherently. When Bond listened carefully he discovered that Q was reciting digits of pi rapid-fire, desperately trying to keep his mind off of the fact that his continued existence relied on what was little more than a roaring hunk of metal. He sounded more than a little panicked. Bond carefully took the slighter man's face between his hands and turned till their eyes locked. He quieted Q's mumbled digits with his lips, pressing softly at the technician's mouth in an almost chaste kiss. It served its desired purpose, if only briefly. Q sighed into James' mouth and was silent. They stayed that way, breathing each other's air, until they were at cruising altitude.

James pulled away slowly but kept his hands on the other's head. He ran his fingers through Q's mop of black hair, tangling it and doing his best to relax the tension he could see in the slim body next to him. At home in one of the two men's apartments, James only had to touch Q's hair to set him limp as wet noodles and purring in contentment but it had no effect here. Q continued to visibly tremble and kept glancing towards the unshaded window behind Bond.

There was nothing else for it then. James pulled the shade over the window and turned back to his Quartermaster. The first class seats were wide and James had learned from long experience that the solid and real worked best with Q. He pulled Q deftly from his chair and fitted him snugly into his own, tucking Q's slight frame next to his own and wrapping him up in a tight hug. Q found his hands tucked into James' chest and the agent's shoulders hunched in a protective arch above him.

He blinked big-eyed up and Bond and shook almost as an afterthought. 007 bent towards him and rested their heads cheek-to-cheek. There, Bond whispered an unceasing tirade of comforting nonsense, reminding Q of the many ways he was trained to kill anything that threatened harm to the smaller man, and did he think that James would let him on a flight if any danger would come of it? The stiffness in Q's muscles never entirely left but it leaked out slowly at the insistence of James' warm hands and comforting presence.

When the attendant came 'round to tell them off, as they are so fond of, James almost growled at the woman's insistence that they could not stay that way. Bond went back to his Quartermaster when the sharp tap of Moneypenny's heels signaled her arrival. She calmly explained the situation and waved away any further complaints. She led the woman away by her elbow, insisting that the men were fine and that the attendant could return to other passengers, but while she was at it could she please bring back a shaken dry martini and a tumbler of whiskey?

With the help of James and a generous amount of alcohol, Q made it through the entirety of the flight without much incident. That didn't mean that both men weren't exhausted and a bit sore from their cramped positions, not to mention a little drunk.

Well, Bond was tipsy. Seeing his partner in such a state was stressful when he could do nothing to right the situation. The Quartermaster could only be described as drunk. To no one's surprise he had always been a lightweight when it came to alcohol and he might have overdone it while trying to distract himself.

It was a feat getting the two through baggage claim and into a cab towards their hotel but Moneypenny was not a woman to be trifled with. The cold air whistling through an open window helped to clear everyone's heads and by the time they were all crammed into a glass elevator headed up she was convinced that Bond at least had enough of his brain present to get the Quartermaster into bed without incident.

Eve left her boys at her hotel room and wished them a good evening. Surely, they could manage getting down the hall to their shared room on their own.

She was wrong.

Q had become giddy at his arrival safely back to earth and everything had taken on a lovely, slap-happy feel to it. He grinned almost constantly at Bond and waved ridiculously at Moneypenny as she snorted and shut her door. Turning to the man beside him slipped up and stole a kiss, saying, "Let's race!"

"Race?" Bond asked in amusement. This version of the man he loved was quite entertaining. He already had plans in the back of his mind to get Q very very drunk once they were safely back in London.

"Yah, race. To our room. Down there," he pointed a bit haphazardly down the hall towards the men's suite. "Whoever wins gets a prize." His grin grew wider and took on a feral quality at the thought of what "prize" he could ask of Bond.

"Oh really?" he smirked. He suffered no doubts that he would win and was already contemplating his prize once they made it inside. "Fine. On the count of three then?" He stood the suitcases against a wall and took his place beside Q.

"One…two…three!"

They took off, Q throwing elbows to put the agent behind him. Laughing like mad, both sprinted for their lives. It all went swimmingly until Q lost his balance. He tripped over his own feet and went sprawling, taking James with him quite by accident. James lost his breath in a surprised whoosh as he landed fairly hard in an ungraceful heap on the hall floor. He looked over at his Quartermaster beside him and started to chuckle again. Q was sprawled wildly on one side, facing James with the most astounded look on his face, as if he couldn't believe that his own limbs would betray him so.

Still laughing quietly, James pulled Q to him and rolled over so that his drunk Quartermaster was lying across his chest. Bond kissed him at his leisure, for once not caring what he needed to do to secure the hotel room or that someone was bound to have heard the ruckus they created.

No, all he cared was that Q tasted invitingly like whiskey.

* * *

Moneypenny did eventually come out in her dressing gown to see what in the world had created such a crash. She smiled to herself when to her surprise she saw nothing but Bond carrying a dozing Q bridal-style into their room.


End file.
